Three years ago, my 35-year-old wife, mother of three children, was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The doctor said she most likely won’t die from it, but will never have a normal life again. After years of being on the medical roller coaster and trying every useless drug on the market, a prestigious neurologist led us to medical marijuana. What a miracle. I’ve seen my wife go from being an empty shell to having a sense of normalcy. She can think, she can actually eat a meal, she can function as a human being, she can sleep at night. My wife is back.

The science is solid. Specific medical strains of marijuana are arguably the most effective treatment for multiple sclerosis.

The problem is the tax, 42 percent to be exact (35 percent plus 7 percent sales tax). No other medicine is taxed in New Jersey. Gov. Chris Christie has done everything in his power to make this program unsuccessful. Only one of the six dispensaries is truly functioning; the rest are caught up in red tape. The costs of all these legal requirements are passed along to the patients.

There are two tiers of registration fees: $200 if you can afford it and $20 if you provide documentation of being low-income. The majority of the cards were at the $20 rate. Being sick and becoming poor tend to go hand-in-hand in our society. The price of an ounce of medical marijuana is $540, cash only, no insurance coverage, and 42 percent of that is New Jersey tax. An ounce in other states with similar programs is as low as $260.

At the very least, if patients qualify for the discounted registration, they should not be taxed on their medicine. Paying $302, tax-free, is at least a step in the right direction. Allowing dispensaries to grow medical marijuana off-site or have a separate growing location or state-allocated farmland would help with supply.

Anyone can find themselves in this very same situation. I urge readers to write or call their state representatives to help reform this broken program. Let’s not tax medicine on the poor.